Slave - Mental Maze interaction

thelonius reloaded wrote: In Obedience case, it's clear the Tremere is no longer the acting vampire (thus the ruling).

In Mental Maze case, is the blocking minion still blocking?

When a Methuselah uses an "about to enter combat" effect, the other Methuselah(s) can use "about to enter combat" effects too - unless the play has been invalidated by an earlier play - such as slave rule followed by Obedience (illegal), which requires the vampire to be entering combat with a younger acting vampire, as you say; or Change of Target followed by Obedience (illegal), because CoT ended the action so Obedience is no longer playable at all.

I go into some detail about an LSJ ruling in
this post from 2014
, citing this earlier ruling from LSJ:
[LSJ 20090513]
. From the terminology used by Floppy (in the original question), the slave rule is activated in a1 and Mental Maze can be activated in a2 (as can a bunch of other things) - which basically means "the acting Methuselah can play her effects by sequencing, then the other Methuselah(s) get their go, with all the normal sequencing rule implications".

While obviously my explanations aren't official, no-one seemed to object at that point.

I'm not entirely sure whether you said "yes, mental maze can still be played in this situation". I think you did, which I sort of agree to. It wouldn't hurt to be slightly more direct.

I was just wondering that the the gargoyle is no longer the minion who was blocked, but mental mazes requirement "successfully blocks an ally or younger vampire" was still satisfied when the tremere was originally blocked. Gargoyle counts as a 'younger vampire' at least, but does it matter if its not the vampire who was successfully blocked or does the swap invalidate the original "succesful block" condition of mental maze? As in, mental mazes condition was satisfied at first, then its no longer applicable. Can mental maze still be played?

Does the satisfied mental maze condition "carry over" to the moment where player B is able to play "before combat" effects? Or does the "being blocked" condition carry over to the gargoyle? I don't believe in this latter one at least. Its just entering combat, nothing is any longer being blocked as the original combat was canceled.

*
As we can see, even slight differences in card wordings can create completely different scenarios. And for some strange reason, people who write these cards feel compelled to use slightly different wordings for cards that do basically same thing. Please don't. Things are complicated enough as it is.

In this case, I think slave rule and other cards that perform a similar "cancel combat and this card enters combat with minion X instead" such as Ohoyo Hopoksia would benefit having their ability written as "Action ends without combat. Then this minion enters combat with acting/reacting minion".

As far as I can see, "Action ends" would sweep away all possible rules complications from minions that are colliding. This should clear things up.

EDIT: Seems like it took me long enough to write that post that multiple posts were posted after that and my question was answered.

"Do you believe in the power of the night?
If you want to go with me, refuse the light"
- Blutengel, Soultaker

jamesatzephyr, thelonius reloaded and greyB are correct: if the slave enters combat instead of the enslaving vampire, Mental Maze can be played by the reacting vampire (not Obedience due to the "acting vampire" reference).

Bloodartist wrote: I was just wondering that the the gargoyle is no longer the minion who was blocked, but mental mazes requirement "successfully blocks an ally or younger vampire" was still satisfied when the tremere was originally blocked.

Yes, the blocking minion has successfully blocked the Tremere.

Bloodartist wrote: Gargoyle counts as a 'younger vampire' at least, but does it matter if its not the vampire who was successfully blocked or does the swap invalidate the original "succesful block" condition of mental maze? As in, mental mazes condition was satisfied at first, then its no longer applicable. Can mental maze still be played?

Mental Maze only cares about the vampire that was blocked, so the Tremere. It still works even if the Gargoyle is older than the blocking vampire.

Bloodartist wrote: Does the satisfied mental maze condition "carry over" to the moment where player B is able to play "before combat" effects? Or does the "being blocked" condition carry over to the gargoyle? I don't believe in this latter one at least. Its just entering combat, nothing is any longer being blocked as the original combat was canceled.

The Tremere was blocked.
The Gargoyle wasn't blocked.
The slave effect unlocks the Tremere, locks the slave, and replaces the combat between the acting minion minion and the blocking minion by a combat between the slave and the blocking minion ("instead")

Bloodartist wrote: As we can see, even slight differences in card wordings can create completely different scenarios. And for some strange reason, people who write these cards feel compelled to use slightly different wordings for cards that do basically same thing. Please don't. Things are complicated enough as it is.

That's historical. Obedience was written long before Mental Maze. Had it been written at the same time, it would probably have the same cardtext. But Obedience works as it is (you can play it even if you haven't blocked) and has many clarifications attached to it.

Bloodartist wrote: In this case, I think slave rule and other cards that perform a similar "cancel combat and this card enters combat with minion X instead" such as Ohoyo Hopoksia would benefit having their ability written as "Action ends without combat. Then this minion enters combat with acting/reacting minion".

It's a bad idea to have a combat occur outside an action. I don't see any problem in making another minion enter combat "instead" of the acting minion.

Bloodartist wrote: As far as I can see, "Action ends" would sweep away all possible rules complications from minions that are colliding. This should clear things up.

It would open can worms and create new complications (why can I tap the Heidelberg during that out-of-action combat and not during regular combat?)

I believe Thelonius is correct. I know that the slave clause beats Obedience in the case of a block, although that is a little different since Obedience specifies 'about to enter combat' rather than block.

That said, if both slave clause and MM occur in the same window (post-block, pre-combat), it seems that the acting vamp has impulse to activate the slave clause first.

-Killiam
(Bill Troxel)
"How did some slip of a girly boy from communist East Berlin become the internationally ignored song stylist barely standing before you?" -Hedwig Robinson

Okay, I don't know how to use this forum quite yet; my response seems to be in reply to a late post from Thelonius, which is not the one I was responding to. Perhaps something to do with the refresh rate of the page with respect to responses. Sorry =/

-Killiam
(Bill Troxel)
"How did some slip of a girly boy from communist East Berlin become the internationally ignored song stylist barely standing before you?" -Hedwig Robinson